Keeping it simple

A trick to quickly resolve SL warnings at the month end closing process

When trying to close the period or year in SL (screen 01.560.00) there may be occasions when SL will warns you that there are unreleased batches. In my mind this error message says that there is a yellow flag being waived which says you started a batch in module xyz but never released it and the period to post is the current period or earlier. Most likely it was a batch which was started but not completed or released. But the only way to know is to go to that suspect module and find the problem batch and process the batch in a manner like delete or release. The challenge often is which Maintenance screen you look at to find the suspect batch. Over the years, I have used this trick, which I recommend you only share with trusted employees.

In SL, you need to close out of all open SL screens and SL reports. Then locate and start the initialization mode. For SL 6.x this area is found by clicking on the Option & Application menu and then clicking on the Initialize Mode sub menu. For SL 7.x users, this screen is launched from a different location. At the top left hand area of the screen, there is a link to Applications, then sub menu Initialize Mode

Click on the Initialize Mode sub menu choice. (Note: I usually repeat this process to make sure that I selected the screen and verify that there is a check before this sub menu.

Next open the Journal Transaction screen, and put your mouse focus on the first field called module and take note that this field is now is black.

Normally this field is grey in color and you cannot access it. But in initialize mode, you have the ability to change the module value to any module (say AP – Accounts Payable), and then move to the next field, which is batch number. When you focus on the Batch number field and hit the F3 key, you have all batches which are in process or completed for this one module. If you click on word "status" in the grey area of the F3 list of possible values, you can sort data in this column.

In this sorted list of batch which was started you can quickly review the "H" or hold batches and also the "B" – balanced for release and "S" – suspended batches. By typing in one of the letters (B, H, S) you can quickly jump to the area where the batches have that status code. Once you find the problem or suspect batch, take note of both the batch number and the screen id. These are you clues to which module to open, and which screen were used to review the partially released batch number. Navigate to find this suspect batch and make the required disposition on this batch so that the next time you attempt to close this module; you will not get the warning messages.

Don't forget to release the "initialize mode" condition. I recommend you log out and log back in the SL.

You may need to deal with your SL administrator to modify your access rights for this screen so that the initialize mode is available to be selected.

Hope this trick helps you if you ever get warning when process the module close activity.

Regards,

Jeff Cozens

What the Dynamics' Compatibilty with Windows 7.0?

I have been reading some blogs that the Dynamics GP 10 version has listed on its system requirements approval list the new Windows 7 operating system.  The latest system requirements posted in both customersource and partnersource displays the following notice:

Microsoft Dynamics GP 10.0 will be compatibility with Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 once it has RTMed."

This is good news for Vista workstation and XP workstation owners who want to upgrade to Windows 7.0 and immediately use their Dynamic GP software

There is no announcement yet as to compatibility of Dynamics SL with Windows 7.0.  I did find this info about the new hyper-V operating system and Dynamics SL:

Microsoft Dynamics SL 7.0 FP1 and Microsoft Dynamics SL 7.0 SP2 or later support Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V. Performance in this virtual server environment will vary based on and not limited to processor, amount of RAM, number of virtual machines you set up, or other software you are running.

 

Hopefully SL will get their version compatable immediately for Windows 7.0.

 

Regards,

 

Jeff Cozens

 

Getting creative with look up windows in Solomon

How you enter a name in the vendor or customer maintenance screens can improve finding last names. The trick is to remember to embed the symbol '@' in front of the last name. For instance if you are entering 1099 vendors in a vendor maintenance screen and you want these names to be displayed by last name first on the vendor listings, then you would enter them as: Firstname @LastName . For instance:

A second trick is to enter the as First Name ~LastName, using the tilde sign. This will cause the name to be flipped in Solomon so that the name is displayed for the saved record as Lastname @FirstName

But when the record is saved, it flips:

Most of our customers have forgotten the trick for the '~' flip option. Try it out and see which method work for you for finding personal names in the PV (Possible Value) look up fields when you hit F3.

Enjoy these keyboard tricks with your Solomon software.

Regards,

Jeff Cozens

Tricking Solomon to display forms

With many of us using remote support more and more, we are found a simple solution to viewing the pesky "forms" when you are remotely attached to a computer. In the Dynamics SL product, when we are printing forms (i.e. AR statements, 1099 forms, AP checks) it can be a challenge because in the printing process we have no ability to print these forms in a preview format, (view on screen). It is impossible to see the printed form without asking for help from your remote client to fax or email a scanned copy of the printed document.

A simple workaround is that you can choose the printer output button on these forms and re direct the form to be printed to file. The next screen in the export to file setup process, which is attained by clicking of the setup printer button, allows you to assign a file name and to assign a file type. I usually choose the crystal pdf option which renders as excellent reproduction of the printed document. Granted I need to go find the printed document but can be displayed on the screen once the pdf is launched.

This tip can be helpful to end users also. Let's say you a want to send a copy of these forms to your accountant or your boss. The saved file can be attached to an email which makes this task a breeze to handle completely at your desk. I'm sure you can think of many other little uses of this trick of printing forms to file which can increase your personal productivity.

Remember increasing your personal productivity makes you more valuable to your boss or your clients.

Jeff Cozens

 

 

 

 

Market growth info for Solomon and Navision

It is often difficult to get an understanding of the growth of specific products. The author interviewed a V P at Deltec software, which is a major software provider in the Government project/ professional services area, and got some interesting information. Here is a summary of the fact I found most interesting:

A recent article published in a magazine for government contractors, the "WashingtonTechnology", (Oct 30, 2008) provides an interesting analysis of the market, Microsoft's plan to go after a larger share of these businesses, and a discussion on how the Dynamics SL and NAV products match the needs of this industry. A representative from Deltek, the largest software vendor serving this sector today, states that Dynamics SL is the closest fit to what they offer with their proprietary system.

Dynamics SL has 15,000 customers and Dynamics NAV has 65,000, (side note: most of these customers are international) she said. "Both of those solutions grew at the rate of 21 percent last year," she said, adding that it is difficult to provide specific government contractor sales figures because they are fragmented across the many Standard Industrial classification codes.

Earlier this year, Gartner Inc. placed Microsoft among its Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence Platforms. The analysis firm said that although Microsoft was late to join the business intelligence platforms market and is still catching up, its platform provides "infrastructure, development tools, workflow and collaboration capabilities that are held in higher regard than those of many of its competitors."

Congrats to both Sl and Nav for a great 2008 year.

 

Jeff

 

Year End Updates

If you are covered by an active support contract for your Dynamics Software, you are eligible for yearend updates for 1099 and w2 forms. Log into your Dynamics customersource web portal to download these updates or send us an email and we can get them for you. If you are using Dynamics SL Payroll, you can also download the 2009 payroll tables for Federal and State payroll deductions, such as income tax, social security etc. Processing these updates before your first accounts payable/ payroll check run; 1099 printing process or W2 process can save you some pain.

 

Also for Dynamics SL users, remember to check that the 2009 year for 1099's is one of your two open tracking years. You can check the status by going to Accounts Payable, then under processes, launch 1099 calendar control. If you still have 2007 1099 year open you will need to "purge" oldest year, to make sure that 2008 and 2009 are your active 1099 tracked years.

 

Jeff

 

 

Learning Tricks by Using Test Database

Key Symptom: The task in the Dynamics ERP software just seems to be taking too many steps.

Solution: Create a Test Database, which is a recent copy of your active database, and experiment. Over the years, with our Dynamics SL customers, we have found that most users can be creative in finding better and faster ways to do re occurring tasks in their accounting processes. Using a test company to create the new processes, to experiment, or just to train the new staff member is a great way to improve utilization.

 

PS. Over the years we are amazed how many times users have literally wanted to kick themselves when they how simple a process really was within Dynamics, when they got proper training. Maybe you too need a little "extra" training.

 

Jeff

A Budgeting we will go

I was talking with Chuck Snider, CFO at Asepco, today. Chuck was bragging because he resurrected some old notes from a training class I had given on how to create and import a budget into Dynamics SL. Chuck said the notes were dated five years ago, but he found them and they still worked. Chuck was excited because for years, literally, he had been exporting the financials to excel where he manually entered the budget each month. Now that entire actual vs. budget report is coming directly out of Dynamics SL. I have always believed that if I could only remember 1 or 2 worthwhile ideas from any training or seminar I attend, then the time was worthwhile. It was exciting to hear that one of the training tricks I gave 5 years ago, actually got implemented.

How do you keep your "good ideas" from getting lost? Have you created a place to store there "future" to be implemented ideas? Now that I think about it, I am going to create a folder on our server to be the storage place for all my "to be implemented" ideas….. I think I'll name the folder "Chuck says to do"

Regards,

Jeff Cozens

When Quickbooks has lost its Quick....

First off, I want to say Quickbooks, by Intuit, is a great product.  At its price point and feature set, it is a strong choice for new businesses or small businesses.   The challenge is when to get off this software and move on to other better suited software.   I recently spoke with a CFO of a publicly traded company who was trying to run their business on Quickbooks and do multi currency consolidation of five sets of books. There closing cycle was at best 45 days; and  way too many excel spreadsheets.  As a public company the thought of impending SOX compliance with Quickbooks was frightening, hence they were looking at their software options.

Recently it came to my attention that this software company, Wizard Productivity Systems (www.wizardx4.com) had taken the concepts of a software installation wizard and applied it to the Quickbooks user who wanted to migrate to Microsoft Dynamics GP.   This wizard migrated both static files and dynamic files from the old accounting software to the new Dynamics GP software.   In a series of English based questions, they gather information as to how you would like to run your business and translated these answers into setup setting, and processes in the GP software.  This company boasts that they can get users converted on a fixed price schedule of consulting support ( 20 to 30 hours) to get you up in running for the financials, purchasing, and sales modules. 

I guess it is makes sense to see the tools for installing software starting to show up for migrating data and doing complex implementations. 

I like the idea of automating the complex setup decisions for new accounting systems, but when I read the information on their web site, I sense that they forgot to remind people that the value of migrating off of Quickbooks was to get better flexibility and reporting.  It will still take, in my opinion, some mixture of identifying key business needs, creative thinking, training and consulting help to get to this end.   

Is there a future "wizard" in your life?